tropic south, the eager north, the agricultural west, have their separate communities, with their jealously-guarded rights which the central power, as it did not give them, cannot abrogate or destroy. Or, as Prof. Flinders Petrie has urged, let the consent of the propertied, the educated, the labouring and the landed classes be severally given for all changes in the law. By some such distribution of power, and so only, will security be afforded that it is the 'concurrent majority' of the people which legislates, and that one section of the nation is not speaking in the name of the whole. Calhoun did not shrink from the extreme consequences of the position. The 'liberum veto' of Poland, which has been the butt of much misplaced ridicule on the part of superior persons, was justified by him as having given to Poland those two centuries of magnificence which culminated in the Relief of Vienna. The Comitia Centuriata at Rome were framed on the same theory; and, when the Comitia Tributa displaced them, the times were ripe for the decay of free institutions. It is surely remarkable, he adds, that at Rome popular liberties were preserved by a right of veto-that of the tribunes. It will be seen that the system so developed is negative. It entrusts separate interests with a veto. This is inherent in the necessities of the case. As we said, the common consciousness of the people is inarticulate, and difficult to plumb. It can only be predicated that, if an important section of the nation is against a particular scheme, that proposal cannot be accepted as in accordance with the national will. It is almost startling at the present day to see with what accuracy Calhoun points out the dangers of an easily-wielded numerical majority. If such a majority is carelessly confused with the 'concurrent' majority, constitutional government slides, first into the government of the 'numerical' majority, and finally into absolute government of some other form. It leads, not to government of the people by the people for the people,' but to government' of a part of the people by a part of the people.' It leads to restrictions on the power of a plurality being regarded with virtuous horror as restrictions on the will of the nation. Calhoun's words of warning fell on deaf ears. State rights could not be abolished by law; they were abolished by force. The United States emerged from the Civil War strong, but less free. They have been drifting, since, towards dictatorship; how rapidly, may be judged from the events of the last ten years. We may not absolutely accept Calhoun's teaching. Some would say that, while it prevents class legislation, it affords no check upon national aberrations; though it may be questioned whether anything would. Others might venture to enquire whether the formula of the supreme value of liberty is not susceptible of analysis; whether it may not in the ultimate analysis be found that the true objective is not to diminish the power of rulers, but to secure that all power shall be commensurate with ability and sympathy, or in Ruskin's simpler language, that the wise and kind shall rule over the unwise and unkind.' That, however, would be to enter upon a wider question. We are concerned at present with the right of a bare majority to pose as dictators. Calhoun's remedy, the splitting-up of power, has been carried very much further by some Continental thinkers. In Denmark, where agricultural co-operation has proved so successful, Dr Torböl of Norre Nebel is urging the grant of the greatest possible share of political power to the smallest possible units of population. Supervision by successively wider and wider areas, with gradually diminishing powers, would guard the fundamental rights of individuals. One object is common to Torböl's proposals and Calhoun's. They aim at eliminating the dictation of centralised cliques backed by the support of a numerical majority. They desire to establish that unanimous concurrence in national affairs which alone can make a nation strong and fortunate. Without some such vivid local and personal interest in politics which a system like Torböl's would afford-he terms it 'Localism' -it may seriously be doubted whether safety is to be found in the Referendum. In a huge mass of voters like the British, with the organised forces of party politics and trades unionism at work, nothing could be easier than to secure a bare Referendum majority for any attractive project of spoliation. It is to be hoped that Mr Balfour's plan may ultimately provide that a twothirds majority, at any rate, should be requisite. It is inconceivable that half the nation should be the serfs of the other half. Even the safeguard of a two-thirds majority is efficacious only so long as the Conservative party retains a sentimental hold upon a certain proportion of the artisan class. This is not the place to discuss the Referendum. It is not, however, inappropriate to point out that it is open to the same objections, and may be quite as thoroughly unjust, as any other mode of dictation by a bare majority. How is it that the superstition of the numerical majority has arisen? It has generally been copied from English parliamentary practice. The problem is therefore to discover how it arose there. Much has been written of late, by Gierke and others, concerning the true nature of a corporation or fictitious person. In the course of the investigation, the question of how the will of the corporation is to be manifested necessarily arises. We may find a very practical illustration of this in the current Irish Reports, which carry us back to Cardinal Jacobatius' discussion (1584) of how far the corporation can deprive its members of their corporate rights. The Corporation of Trinity College, Dublin, by a majority, proposed to consent to an alteration by the Crown of the constitution of that University. It was argued that the consent of every member was necessary; on the other hand, it was maintained that the act of the majority is, by the common law, the act of the corporation. Justice Ross, though allowing that the changes were of a drastic nature, declined to restrain the majority from consenting to them in the name of the whole corporation, on the ground that the pecuniary interest of the dissentients was not affected. He thus got rid of the authority of Ward v. Society of Attorneys, in which Lord Justice Knight Bruce had protected the minority. Mr We see at once the necessity of determining rationally what persons are entitled to speak in vital matters in the name of the whole body, and of enquiring by what means the corporation can make known its will. By affixing its common seal,' says English law; but, then, who is to have the power of lawfully affixing the seal? In old days the question was readily answered: 'anyone who * Gray v. Trinity College, Dublin, 1910, 1 I.R., 370. can get hold of it.' 'If Brother Walter, the sacrist of St Edmund's, gets hold of the seal . . . and therewith seals a bond for forty marks to Benedict the Jew of Norwich, there is nothing for an enraged abbot to do but to depose Brother Walter.'* And normally the abbot kept the seal, and could bind the abbey, and was in fact 'the majority.' Thus the Statute of Carlisle (1307) provided for the seal to be laid up in the custody of five monks, and under the private seal of the abbot. It is stated that in 1449 the Court held this statute void for unreasonableness-a laudable practice which has unfortunately gone out of use for how could a seal ever be used if it were always locked in a box? But it is curious to note that the old muniment chest of the city of Carlisle has five locks, with five keys, and is to be seen to this day in the civic museum there. That obscure and fragmentary document, the 'Leges Henrici,' dating from about 1118, tells us that in early English tribunals the opinion of the majority on the bench prevailed; but, when the author comes to details, he qualifies this by declaring, 'vincat sententia meliorum et cui justitia magis acquieverit.' The sheriff, that is, must decide in accordance with the opinion of the majority; but this must be the majority by rank, repute, and sound judgment.† In such early times as these the corporate character of cities and boroughs is hardly recognised. Cities and towns there are; but their possessions are viewed as the joint possessions of their citizens. In theory the unanimous consent of them all is necessary to dealings with the property. But-again to quote Pollock and Maitland-'the unanimity of ancient moots is wonderful.' 'Dissentients can be shouted down, or compelled to withdraw their opinions.' So that we are still far from the conception of the rule of a bare majority. Half the assembly cannot be shouted down, nor can it be tired out. In 1293 the burgesses (if we may use an inaccurate title) of Toddington convey land; some of them afterwards repudiate the bargain because they were under age at the time. There is no suggestion of their being bound by the majority of adults. Pollock and Maitland (i, 491), quoting Jocelyn de Brakelonda. † Pollock and Maitland (ii, 539) give a rather different interpretation. Majority decisions came to be accepted at a comparatively early date for the election of members of Parliament. This has, of course, no direct bearing on the problem of the origin of majority rule; for the diversity of interests represented by the various constituencies was sufficient to secure that minorities would have a voice in the House of Commons. Even in elections, however, unanimity long prevailed. By the Reform Act of 1406 returns were to be sealed by all the county electors. The majority of votes was made decisive in 1430, when the forty-shilling freeholder was introduced. In the boroughs it was different. At York, in 26 Eliz.,* we find the majority of thirty-six freeholders nominating four burgesses; then the whole town council appointed two of them and sealed the election. At Worcester, in 1466, the borough members were chosen by the most voice.' But the whole of our medieval history scarcely furnishes more than one or two instances of a contested county election; the town histories too are nearly silent.' + Ecclesiastical contests were very frequent; but here there was a superior authority to decide matters. In 1299 the monks of Ely were divided in the election of a bishop; § the majority chose Prior John, the minority the Chancellor, John Langton. The chapter seal was affixed to the record of neither party's election; the king took upon him to confirm the candidate of the minority. The matter was carried to Rome and compromised. Well into the fourteenth century there seems to be no record of dissent in the choosing of a London mayor;|| though there is an undercurrent of popular dissatisfaction with the exercise of the choice by a select few. The Chronicon Angliæ' (p. 112), indeed, presents us with a picture of an early majority election-that of a Speaker by the knights of the shire in 1377. But the knights had been packed by the Duke of Lancaster, and the minority was insignificant; 'pauci de fidelioribus, qui remanserant, tantæ multitudini non poterant prævalere.' It is clear that the chronicler considered that a stronger minority would have obtained more consideration. • Drake, 'Eboracum,' p. 358. + Stubbs, iii, 451, citing Smith's 'Gilds,' p. 393. + Ib. p. 452. |